headlights
by Dessers
Summary: You were driving. Santana/Brittany angst
1. prolouge

**Because I'm such a bitch and I write angsty things and I don't what happened, but I'd like some feedback on my second person. I DON'T EVEN KNOW RIGHT NOW. I might continue this, who knows.  
><strong>

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><p>...<p>

_I remember tears streaming down your face,_  
><em>When I said, "I'll never let you go,"<em>  
><em>When all those shadows almost killed your light<em>  
><em>I remember you said, "Don't leave me here alone,"<em>  
><em>But all that's dead and gone and passed tonight.<em>

_...  
><em>

It's the beginning of June, when you and Brittany step out of that movie theater, into the warm summer air. Your fingers are intertwined in hers and you wonder how you ever got so lucky.

"That was a good movie, huh, San? I like romantic comedies. 'Cause they're all like... crazy, stupid in love... Kinda like us, don't you think?" She beams, like sunshine, whipping her long silky blond hair out of her face.

You grin back, because she's infectious and so_ damn perfect_. You doubt you'll ever deserve her. "Definitely. I love you so much, B."

"I love you, too." Brittany leans in to peck your lips. You smile again, because she's completely right. You're crazy, stupid in love.

It scares you how much you love her sometimes. The sun rises and set on Brittany, as far as you're concerned. Soul mates. The two of you are soul mates.

Laughing and smiling, you get in the SUV. You're always smiling around her. Really, you've never been mad at Britt for longer then five minutes.

You are driving, because Brittany will get too distracted by the streetlights or the enchanting full moon. She's a dreamer, always seeing the little things you never could. Brittany's world is beautiful and magical, but it always looks the same through your eyes. You're too realistic, forced to grow up too fast. You see things in black and white, but Brittany's world is in a whorl of brilliant technicolor. You're hardened, street-smart, and tough. She has the innocence you lost when you were so young, you almost envy it but you can't feel anything negative towards her. It's just not possible.

Because she's Brittany and you're Santana and you've loved her almost as long as you can remember. Ever since you saw her walking down the hallways, in her little Cheerio's uniform, with her big blue eyes and goofy smile. She's all that's good in your world, she's the reason the days in this cow town are bearable.

So, grinning at the girl in the passenger's seat, you pull out of the parking lot in your dad's SUV. Soon enough you and Britt are singing along to the radio, speeding down the highway.

Laughing at Brittany's silly faces in rear view mirror, your eyes flit off the rode for a second. Only a split-second, you swear.

You didn't see it. God, you swear you didn't see the truck barreling down the road, until it was right _there._

Everything happened so_ quickly._You didn't even know what was happening.

The headlights of the oncoming truck blind you. They bore wholes in your brain, unable to escape from the cage of your memory.

You want to swerve, desperately veer off the road. The car is headed straight into the path of the giant truck that is driving way too fast. But you can't seem to move. Your arms lock, they're rigid and unbending.

_"Brittany!"_ You scream, your eyes squeezed shut,_ "Brittany!"_

Fear grips you, cold and unforgiving. You scream, wordlessly noise coming out of your throat.

Impact.

The truck slams into your SUV, leaving you spinning uncontrollably off the road.

You don't see your life flashing past your eyes, you don't even feel your life slipping away, you don't even feel afraid. All you can think of is her. Brittany. You desperately need to know she's going to be alright, that's she going to be okay. Because she _needs_ to be okay. You don't even care about yourself at all, as long as Brittany's safe. Before Brittany, no one would've describe you a selfless. You're a selfish bitch, with razor instincts for your own survival.

But things are different with Brittany. They always were.

The airbags inflate and you're harshly thrown against them. A sharp pain shoot through your jaw and you hear a faint crack that sounds a lot like your nose.

But Brittany... She shatters right through the windshield and topples over the hood, while you hysterically scream her name. She doesn't respond.

Adrenaline and fear and this awful, gripping helpless feeling shoots through your veins, because you can't_ do_ anything.

_"Britt! Brittany!"_

Then everything fades out of focus and goes black.

...

Eventually, you wake up, red and blue ambulance lights whirring around in your vision. Your head pounds and your nose throbs.

"Where's Brittany?" You demand, your throat dry and scratchy, "Where is she?"

The paramedic doesn't reply, just tries to get you to lay back down. But you can see.

Her eyes are closed. There's deep gashes on Brittany's limp body. And all the blood. Oh, god, the blood... There's just so much of it. You didn't even know there was that much blood in people. It's everywhere. All over Brittany and her Cheerio's jacket and her favorite jeans.

It makes you feel like ice, cold and so numb, seeing the blood matted in her corn silk hair. You scream and yell as people flood out of the ambulance, trying to revive her.

But they never can.

__(You were driving...)__

__...__

Brittany Susan Pierce dies on the seventh of June, on a Tuesday. She's pronounced dead at the scene, the ambulance doesn't make it there fast enough.

She was only eighteen years old.

...

You don't cry during the funeral, just stare numbly at the coffin as the lower her body into the ground, but the second you sit down in Sam's car you start sobbing and cannot stop.

...

_Just close your eyes,_  
><em>The sun is going down,<em>  
><em>You'll be alright,<em>  
><em>No one can hurt you now,<em>  
><em>Come morning light,<em>  
><em>You and I'll be safe and sound.<em>

_...  
><em>


	2. shake it out

**WHOA HOLY FUCK SHE'S UPDATING.**

**AFTER THE AWFUL DROUGHT OF IDEAS AND INSPIRATION, MY MUSE IS BACK AND THE WRITER'S BLOCK IS GONE. Cheers! This might suck... Forgive me. I'm rusty. Oh, and the song lyrics used are Shake It Out by Florence + Machine. You can even play the amazing Glee cover in background if you wish!  
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**Reviews and feedback are cool.  
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><p>...<p>

_And I'm damned if I do and I'm damned if I don't,_  
><em> So here's to drinks in the dark at the end of my road,<em>  
><em> And I'm ready to suffer and I'm ready to hope,<em>  
><em> It's a shot in the dark and right at my throat.<em>

...

You want to lash out, but you're too tired.

It's not fair.

This isn't how it's supposed to be, it's not. You're supposed to be Brittany&Santana, just the two of you against the the world. You had your future planned out, planned out with her. Go to college, get jobs, get married with kids and a house and the whole package.

Car crashes and death and this awful loneliness... They were not part of the plan, your plan.

You're supposed to be at college now, getting on with your life and making plans for the future. Yeah. You're supposed to be doing a lot of things.

But you can't.

You live, stuck, in a world of broken memories. Lord Tubbington and Charity, her cats, slink around your house because you refuse to let anyone get rid of them. Her things lay, piled into boxes around your room, serving as a constant reminder that she isn't here anymore. Because even her parents couldn't take staring at their dead daughter's possessions. You toss and turn at night, tangled up in her favorite quilt, swearing you can still smell the faintest hints of her perfume.

...

Her name's become a taboo around you. Every since the crash you haven't uttered her name once. You just can't bring yourself to for some reason. It's like... It's like if you say her name and use it in past tense it'll somehow mean she's never coming back, that she's really just _gone._

_(The only time you say her name is when you scream it in your sleep, begging a dead girl to come back and fix you.)_

You sleep a lot, because, well, it's better than being awake.

_...  
><em>

For the longest time, you have the sensation of drowning all the time. Without her around you feel like you're underwater, struggling desperately to breathe. Everything feels foggy and blurry without her. Nothing matters anymore without her.

It doesn't help that everyone's moved on. Rachel, Finn, and Kurt are all in New York. Mike and Mercedes are both on the West Coast. Quinn, the only one who can even possibly begin to understand the whole that her death left in every aspect of your life, is off at Yale. Even your own parents carefully avoid you.

Sugar, Blaine, Tina, Joe, and Sam try to visit because they're still at school. It's awkward and forced, and you don't even make an effort to make it less so. You just stared into space, as if something, _someone_, will materialize there._ (Which is really just a heavy case of wishful thinking...)_

Eventually, they stop visiting because no one want to comfort you, the sad girl who's just so fucking angry at life for the hand its dealt her.

Only Puck still visits relentlessly. He sits by your side, not even talking some days. Some days he brings alcohol because you both have a thing for bad decisions and drunken stupors.

At least you don't have to feel.

...

"Get up." Puck orders.

"What?" You look up from your bed, as he storms into your room.

"We're going to _Scandals_." Typical. Noah Puckerman's solution for just about everything involves bars.

"Puck!" You croak, "I don't want to."

He starts rummaging through your closet, "This isn't about what you want right now. It's about what your need. Santana, you haven't been out of your house for weeks. I don't even know the last time you even ate anything. Quinn's practically making herself sick over how much she's worried over you. We're all worried." He pauses, staring at you in your dirty sweatshirt, with your greasy hair. "...I'm worried, okay?"

Puck throws a dress and clean underwear at you, his poker face on, "So, we're going out."

"I'm not ready. Not yet." You whisper, staring at your hands.

"Do you honestly think you'll ever be ready?" He asks.

You don't have an answer to that question, so you stay silent.

"Go shower, San. We're leaving in an hour."

...

Next thing you know, you're sitting in the passenger's seat of his truck wearing clean clothes and freshly showered in what feels like forever. For the past months, you've basically let yourself go.

"This is gonna be great," Puck promises, but you have a feeling you both know he's wrong.

He pulls into _Scandals _and at first it's okay. Puck buys you martinis and tries to be a wing man for all the gay guys in bar, much to their amusement. You let Puck lead you onto the dance floor and he tries to dance with you. But his feet are a lot bigger than _hers_ were and he keeps accidentally stepping on your toes so you just end up awkwardly swaying back and forth.

Puck twirls you and you even smiles a small, closed lipped smile, but it's the first time you've smiled in months. It's your first smile since Tuesday, June 7th actually.

Things are going really well, until a blue eyed blond with a miniskirt on starts to flirt with you and you just lose it. You flee the bar, and plop down on the pavement outside already crying. Puck, who had seen the whole thing, follows you out.

"You need you let go of her, Santana! Brittany is _dead_. And she's not coming back because she is _dead_." He yells, his eyes burning, spitting out his words like poison. "You can't live like this! You're just a... a... a _shell_ of who you were."

"I-I can't!" You cry so hard you're hiccuping between your sobs, "I can't, Puck, I can't. I can't, I can't, I can't."

There's some things you just don't ever get over.

"Yes, you can." He whispers into your hair.

...

Puck takes you home and let's you cry until you have no tears left to cry.

And maybe you're ready to start letting go.

...

_I am done with my graceless heart,_  
><em> So tonight I'm gonna cut it out and then restart,<em>  
><em> Cause I like to keep my issues drawn,<em>  
><em> It's always darkest before the dawn.<em>

_...  
><em>


	3. epilouge

**Last chapter! This took quite a while, because I kept changing directions with it. Thanks for sticking around guys, I've loved the reviews! And sorry if I made any cry because of angst, it's okay - I cried too.**

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><p>...<p>

_And I've been a fool and I've been blind,_  
><em> I can never leave the past behind,<em>  
><em> I can see no way, I can see no way,<em>  
><em> I'm always dragging that horse around.<em>

...

Brittany Susan Pierce has been dead for five years and eight months.

You could probably still count the hours, the minutes, the seconds since she's died. But you try not to do things like that anymore because it nearly tore you in half, and you couldn't remember how to be whole for the longest time. _(And really you're still not completely whole, you never will be, but you can try.)_

You still drive to her grave and leave her favorite flowers, daffodils because they reminded her of Daffy Duck, once a month.

Without Brittany, getting out of Lima never seemed important so you didn't. Maybe your eighteen year old self, before the crash, would be furious and disappointed you hadn't managed to leave Lima behind. But her death almost tethers you here. You have to check up on Brittany, it keeps you sane in a way.

It's not like anyone has forgotten. Quinn, Kurt, Puck, Mike, Sam... all of the Glee Club still miss her, they always will. But you're the only one who is still desperately holds on to her memory, always unable to completely let go.

And you still dream about her, like a cold hard reminder, and what your life would've been like if she lived. The houses you two would've lived in, the places you would've seen, the firsts you would've had... they haunt your dreams.

No, you'll never love anyone the way you love Brittany, in that honest, pure way you can only love your first love.

But... there's someone new now.

A spitfire with bright eyes and red hair, who loves life and teaches you to love it, too. She's absolutely nothing like Brittany at all, because even though you could go a find someone to love like Brittany you know deep down they'd never be enough.

And you love her, this new girl who's saved you from yourself. She helped you slay your demons, she saved you from screaming nightmares where it happens all over again, she made you feel again.

But she's not Brittany and she never will be.

It took awhile for you both to accept that. The fact that you're not quite each other's soul mates, because your soul mate died in a car crash on June 6, 2012. But you love her, and she loves you, so it has always been enough.

You wonder why she would chose to love you, this broken creature who can't give her all of your blackened heart. But she does anyways so you're just thankful for her and the life she's given you, the peace you finally have.

Suburbia and simplicity and a life without flashing light and glamor and fame, it's not as bad as you had always thought it would be. And you almost enjoy the quiet, just living privately.

You, your wife, and your daughter living in small town Lima, Ohio. It used to be your biggest fear, to be still in Lima when you're all grown up... but you like it. Lima is home and it always will be.

You're a mom now. You have a beautiful baby girl with bright eyes who you love more than anything in the whole wide world. And you want to raise her in the place that feels like home.

And you're not a bad mom. You love that little girl more than anything in the entire world, she's your world.

You whisper lullabies into your daughter's hair, making silent promises to protect her from anything that could hurt her like you used to promise her namesake.

The first time you broke your promise, but this time you won't.

You can't.

...

_And it's hard to dance with a devil on your back,_  
><em> And given half the chance would I take any of it back,<em>  
><em> It's a fine romance but it's left me so undone,<em>  
><em> It's always darkest before the dawn.<em>

..


End file.
